This October the Cenobites are back. Watch the official trailer for “Hellraiser”

The horror and gore movie Hellraiser (1987) became one of the key titles of the late 1980s for the fans of the genre more into extreme emotions than only mild scares. The movie marked the debut as a director of a feature film of Clive Barker, who had two of his horror stories already adapted to the big screen, Rawhead Rex (1986) and Underworld (1985), and pushed him to a high level of popularity. The movie was based on Barker’s novel The Hellbound Heart and told the story of a woman who discovers the newly resurrected, partially formed, the body of her brother-in-law, and starts killing for him to revitalize his body so he can escape the demonic beings that are pursuing him after he escaped their sadistic underworld.

Hellraiser (1987) introduced to the world the universe of the Cenobites, a group of extra-dimensional, sadomasochistic beings who cannot differentiate between pain and pleasure, and popularized the evil creature Pinhead as the most iconic visual elements of the film. It also spammed into a saga with its nine sequels, with Hellraiser: Judgment (2018) being the closure.

Plans for a Hellraiser remake commenced in October 2007 with French filmmakers Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury, the creators of À l’intérieur (2007), Livid (2011), another entry in a popular American horror saga Leatherface (2017) and Kandisha (2020) [read our review here], on board. The project suffered a bunch of creative changes while several other filmmakers were involved until after the critical and commercial success of Halloween (2018), Miramax Films confirmed plans for new Hellraiser installments, including a prequel and a reboot in 2018.

Hellraiser (2022) is directed by David Bruckner, responsible for The Signal (2007), The Ritual (2017), The Night House (2020), and the segments “Amateur Night” in V/H/S (2012) and “The Accident” in Southbound (2015) horror anthologies. Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski, the writers of Siren (2016), Super Dark Times (2017), and Stephanie (2017), have written the screenplay based on a story by David S. Goyer, the writer of The Crow: City of Angels (1996), Dark City (1998), Jumper (2008), Terminator: Dark Fate (2019), The Unborn (2009), which he also directed, and several DC Comics adaptations including Christopher Nolan’s Batman’s Dark Knight trilogy, the Blade trilogy, and Man of Steel (2013).

One of the first things that were advertised in the movie is that this time the character Pinhead is played by a female actress, Jamie Clayton, who is better known for the recurrent role of Nomi Marks in the science-fiction series Sense8 (2015-2018). The rest of the cast in the movie is formed by Odessa A’zion, Brandon Flynn, Goran Višnjić, Drew Starkey, Adam Faison, Aoife Hinds, Selina Lo, and Hiam Abbass.

The plot for Hellraiser (2022) is based on the classic story that brought out the first franchise by Clive Barker, who remains the producer of the film. A young woman struggling with addiction comes into possession of an ancient puzzle box, unaware that its purpose is to summon the Cenobites, a group of sadistic supernatural beings from another dimension.

As it couldn’t be different, Hellraiser (2022) is Rated R for strong bloody horror violence and gore, language throughout, some sexual content, and brief graphic nudity. The movie is set to have its world premiere at Beyond Fest on October 4, 2022, and later it will have a digital premiere on October 7, 2022, as a Hulu Original.

The first official trailer has been released now by 20th Century Studios and you can watch it here.